leap towards your future

Words, sentences, paragraphs later. Minutes, hours, weeks later. We apply to college, betting everything on the line, to get into a college. Everyone sets their own goals, and we all race each other to the finish line. What are we actually racing towards? Who knows? 

If we get into a great college or an okay college or a not-so-great college, is our future determined? I think we learned from Oedipus that your future isn't sealed unless you let it be. You can bet it all or not try at all, you never know what the future holds for you. Does this mean we shouldn't try it all? Of course not. The effort you put in now does matter, but it's important for us to realize that we must not become fixated on college as if the rest of our lives depend on it. It's merely a bridge to the next step, the next milestone of our lives. 

Ultimately, the greatest elements of our future are determined by the intangible, unquantifiable experiences in high school - the work ethic we build, the relationships we make, and the way we treat others. Don't believe me? It'd be naive of me to say halfway to November 1st that you should "be kind," but I can say without a doubt that we must not lose the very identities we've worked so hard to build to bet it all on merely the next step in our life.

At the end of the day, I’m writing this for my own catharsis as I navigate the stressful experience of college applications alongside all of you. No matter where we end up, we start an educational journey anew. We’re working not towards a destination, but the next journey. It’s simply our time to find where and what kind of journey that’ll be. Maybe the stress puts us through great struggles now, but only because we’re conscious about our futures. This is our moment to shine and take the next step. Embrace it. Leap towards your future.